train_essays: 43
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| rowid | id | prompt_id | text | generated |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 43 | 09978576 | 1 | The anachronism that is the electoral college is a system that unfairly represents voters and can possibly lead to catastrophe. The much simpler solution would be election by popular vote where every voter in every state matters rather than the system of the electoral college that discounts many voters opinions. The arguments against popular vote are either illogical or inconsequential and we as a nation should pay no heed. The biggest and most obvious problem with our current electoral college system is that it unfairly represents voters in the states. An example of this unfairness towards voters propagated by the system is expressed in "In Defense of the Electoral College: Five reasons to keep our despised method of choosing the President" by Richard A. Posner where it is stated that in the 2012 election between rodney and Obama Florida gave all of its electoral votes towards Obama when he only won 61.7 percent of the vote. This method completely exludes the opinion of the minority, that 48.3 percent of people in Florida who didn't vote for Obama got their say taken away, their opinion no longer mattered to the election because all of the electors were given to Obama by a small majority. A second unfairness to the voters is the attention taken away from any voter not in a swing state. In the article written by Bradford Plumer named "The Indefensible Electoral College: Why even the bestlaid defenses of the system are wrong" it is said that in the 2000 election that seventeen states got no attention from the candidates whatsoever. This system gives undeserved attention to a few swing states which will decide the election because of our outdated system of the electoral college. If popular vote was instituted the attention given to voters of all states would be equal as every vote from every state matters. A problem with the electoral college that could possibly outshine the unfairness of it would be the potential for catastrophe that it brings. As is stated in "The Indefensible Electoral College: Why even the bestlaid defenses of the system are wrong" by Bradford Plumer the electors presented by the states according to popular vote are not even obliged to vote for the candidate they said they would. Even though this may be a rare occurace a single elector betraying his party could cause misrepresentation of millions of Americans. Another possible disaster would be a tie vote in the electoral college. This situation, as explained in the same article, would cause a vastly unfair election incomparable even to the unfairness of the normal system. This horrible system consists of each state getting one vote for the president which when you consider that some states have many times the population of others means that millions upon millions of people could have the same say a a couple hundred thousands, an injustice unthinkable in our society and one that could be stopped by instituting a popular vote system. The arguments against popular vote presented in "In Defense of the Electoral College: Five reasons to keep our despised method of choosing the President" by Richard A. Posner are unrealistic, unsupported, or insignificant. The argument presented as "Certainty of Outcome" says that a dispute over popular vote would be much more common but provides no evidence to support the claim, invalidating it. The article's second argument states that candidates would have more incentive to stay in their region if popular vote were implemented but this entire argument relies on the fact that there are not enough electors in any one region in order to elect a president. Although this is true it doesn't matter because the same is true of population, no one region has an overwhelming population advantage over others and population is what matters in popular vote. The third argument is the most illogical stating that the electoral college's tendency of causing only swing states to matter is actually a good thing because it increases the education of the populations of those states by the increased attention by the candidate, therefore the educated would decide the vote, making it more accurate. This is a parochial and shortsighted viewpoint, not considering the fact that the system of popular vote would make candidates pay attention to all populations, making all voters more educated rather than having some elite educated aristocracy in the swing states. The articles fourth argument is possibly even more deluded than the third, stating that large states get more attention because of the electoral college which balances out the fact that states have hugely varying populations but the exact same thing would happen in popular vote because some states have larger populations and candidates need larger populations for election in popular vote. The electoral college in this instance changes nothing meaning that the argument leads nowhere. The only argument presented in "In Defense of the Electoral College: Five reasons to keep our despised method of choosing the President" by Richard A. Posner that has any merit is the fifth which shows that popular vote could lead to possibly complicated runoff elections. Although that is a disadvantage of popular vote I believe that the vast unfairness and averting disaster is worth the cost of slightly complex runoff elections. To support the electoral college one must rely on unrealistic or insignificant evidence. This "evidence" can be easily refuted and outwieghed by strong evidence from the opposing side. To support the electoral college you are supporting unfairness and catastrophe and to any reasonable person that is not a very intelligent idea, making the need for popular vote irrefutable. | 0 |